An international conference on Haiti co-organized by Austria, Canada, the Dominican Republic, and other partners was held in November 2025 under the theme “Haiti at the Crossroads: Charting Security and Development for a Sustainable Future.” The conference brought together representatives of donor governments, UN agencies, civil society, and the Haitian transitional government to discuss the comprehensive response that Haiti’s crisis demanded and to make the case for increased international solidarity.
The conference presented stark figures that defined the challenge: six million Haitians — half the population, including 3.3 million children — requiring humanitarian assistance; the UN appeal for $908 million funded at only 21.9 percent; over 1.7 million people risking receiving no assistance at all; the least funded humanitarian appeal in the world. The participants heard that “solidarity is not optional, but rather existential” and that without increased international action, the total collapse of state presence in the capital could become irreversible.
Conference discussions moved beyond emergency measures to focus on Haiti’s long-term trajectory, with participants stressing that the transformation of the MSS into the Gang Suppression Force offered a new opportunity but that security alone was insufficient. A holistic approach linking security, governance, and development was described as essential to breaking the cycle of instability that had defined Haiti’s crisis.
Canada’s Ambassador to the UN, Bob Rae, articulated what many participants expressed: the need for more, better coordinated, and more sustained international action across all dimensions of the crisis simultaneously. The conference concluded with a clear message but without the specific financial commitments that advocates had hoped for — another conference whose urgency of language was not matched by the scale of resources mobilized.